


Etiquette

by thenostalgicdreamer



Category: Girl Meets World
Genre: F/M, Secret Santa, gmw
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-14
Updated: 2018-01-14
Packaged: 2019-03-04 23:24:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13375272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thenostalgicdreamer/pseuds/thenostalgicdreamer
Summary: Isadora ponders how Zay’s unexpected gift makes her feel.





	Etiquette

She walked home from the secret Santa exchange at Topanga’s feeling strange indeed. What were these feelings she was feeling? Since when did something make her feel so strongly that she had to wipe her eyes?

If she was honest, she knew it had everything to do with the thick blue book under her arm. But wasn’t she the Isadora Smackle who had everything figured out and had conquered the etiquette book long ago? Who did Zay think he was to turn all of that on its head? 

——————————————————————   
Izzy had only been four years old when she had discovered Emily Post’s Etiquette in the corner of her parents’ library. She had taken it to her dad who had explained that it was a book for older people and had suggested she wait to read it. Being the dutiful girl that she was, she had taken it back to its place on the shelf again. When she was eight years old, she had ambitiously asked her parents again assuming that she must be old enough to read it. To her surprise, they had told her not to read it. Instead of saying she was too young, they had merely explained that the book was for other people and that she didn’t need to know about its contents. 

What they hadn’t known was that they had said the one thing most likely to spark her curiosity. Learning always intrigued her, but there was nothing like learning something difficult to access and forbidden. 

So the next few weeks had found her pouring over the contents of the etiquette whenever her parents weren’t looking. She was surprised to discover that she was so far from society’s definition of normal. She wasn’t quiet and polite and self controlled. Instead, she talked out of turn about subjects that were considered off limits. She had always known that she was different than her friends at school, and the doctors had said that that was because of Asperger’s syndrome, but she had never realized the implications of that reality.

She had felt the Aspergers diagnosis, but her parents had explained that it was just part of who she was like her genius level IQ. Most of the time, she had accepted it as such. But reading the etiquette book had made it all come alive for her in a new way. Not only was she different from her friends, she was different from everyone else, from being normal. Worst of all, that was never going to change. She would be a grownup version of herself, and the other girls would be the perfect lady of the etiquette book. It would be that way forever. 

That thought had been more painful than anything Smackle had ever experienced before and had dragged her into a period of what she now realized was sadness. Why was she so dreadfully flawed and other? Why her? Why? Why? Why?   
After a few weeks of pondering the case, she had been struck by the thought that the book had not been written by someone of her intelligence and that it was not written for people of her intelligence. Why was she comparing herself to her intellectual inferiors? The book was nothing more than a ploy of inferior humans to find something attractive about themselves. She didn’t need that. She was a genius. 

With that, she had forgotten about the etiquette book and needing to be normal. She had pursued her own dreams and milked her intelligence to the last drop. That is until she had opened the paper and saw the shade of blue that only belonged to the etiquette book. Realizing what it was had felt like a slap to the face. Zay had no right to tell her how she was supposed to be. Didn’t he know that she was a brilliant girl?

But then he had sat beside her and showed her the notes in the margin. There were so many that she didn’t want to calculate how many hours it would have taken him to make them. Although most of the text of the book was crossed out, he had still chosen to use the book as a template. That was because he didn’t see her as hopelessly other. No, he just believed that she was unique and very beautiful girl. That was unbelievable when she had long given up on being normal. She couldn’t describe how it made her feel to know that someone saw her as just like everyone else with special quirks that made her beautiful. And then he had also mentioned that she had been working on things. That was true, but how had he managed to notice her little efforts?

It had been such a magical moment, so unlike anything she had ever experienced before. She had many people who loved her, but they never made her feel like this. Zay didn’t just accept her for who she was. He thought she was beautiful and spectacular loving even the things that she had always secretly hated about herself, and his hope was boundless that as she changed and grew more of her beautiful self would shine through. There weren’t words for how that made her feel, but if she had to attempt, she would chose content, accepted, loved. 

She hadn’t ever believed that anyone would love her like this. Her parents were endlessly kind but their love was often mixed with pity as they saw her as their brilliant daughter who also had a disability. Riley and Maya were nice enough, but they had always agreed with her that she was different than they were. And Farkle–she knew that he loved her. However, so much of their relationship was wrapped up in being close to being intellectual equals. Even though he had the ability to appreciate her brains like few did, he had never made her feel like this. 

Zay’s book with the notes in the margin made her feel like she could conquer not as its queen, but as an ordinary but spectacular woman with a normal but beautiful life. As confusing as it was, she couldn’t stop smiling. She was loved; she was enough. And she felt her heart overflowing with love for Zay for doing what no one had ever done for her before. 

That thought stopped her like a ton of bricks. This was Zay she was talking about, her goofy friend. She wasn’t supposed to feel this way about him. She was in love with Farkle–she had been for years. His intelligence sent her heart flip flopping, and he brought that crooked smile to her face. But she had never felt like this about him. He didn’t make her heart feel like it was overflowing with feelings to strong to describe.

What was going on? She loved Farkle, or at least she had always believed she did. Now, she felt something totally different–something science could never explain. What was she going to do? She had no idea. She might be a genius, but that couldn’t help her now. All she knew was that Zay’s etiquette book had turned her world upside down and nothing would ever be the same.


End file.
